Kim Dotcom: The Full Story | Hacker News Reader

Kim Dotcom: The Full Story

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28 pointsokl7 comments

I'm intrigued by the concept of counterfeit phone cards. (I mean the ones mentioned before the CCC section. The CCC part seems to be about SIM cards, maybe a bad translation.)

As I understand it, modern phone cards are just some long phone number prefix with an associated PIN, and I don't know how you could meaningfully counterfeit those, as the system surely checks the account number, PIN and remaining balance are correct. I guess it might be possible to steal them if you can force a store employee to activate them for you, but a fake card would be worthless, right?

It made me wonder if these were some kind of stored-value system, where the card can't be validated by phoning home. Apparently Austria had those. But from re-reading I don't think that's what Germany had, though I'm not sure.

Was it simply a way to scam other scene members by selling them worthless plastic? I don't get it.

It has been a very long time but I believe the logic was on the chip of the card. I vaguely remember that Tron of the CCC built simulators of cards that could be used to call for free. Maybe some research in that direction could lead to more on that topic.

Oh boy, this takes me back. This is from memory, so take it with a grain of salt: The calling cards I mainly used as a kid in the 90s were ones with a sim-like chip on it that you would insert into a phone booth until it ran out at which point you'd throw them away. Earlier/alternative ones worked, iirc, by calling a free phone line which prompted you to enter a valid calling card number which had credit assigned to it, and then you could make your call. If there was a way to reverse engineer the algorithm for valid calling card numbers (similar to a keygen) I guess you could hack it for free calls. If someone has a more plastic / accurate memory of this please correct me

(Corresponding wiki entry for the remote version: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Telephone_card#Remote_memory_s... )

"His extradition order was eventually signed on 15 August 2024." cf. [Kim Dotcom](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kim_Dotcom)

That's pretty far from the full story. It's missing giant swaths.

A new Assange, he will wait for years in prison for a trial and then be released. So that's what mighty BigCo punishment means nowdays.

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